Escape From Tentacle City- Halloween in Tentacle City

[Willow]

Last week I played a game of Escape From Tentacle City, using the new set of rules and tweaks to the mechanics.  I found it played pretty well, but I think a large part of that was player familiarity with the game.  The endgame is still rather weak, but I have a few ideas for changing it without having to radically alter the rest of the game, which I'm very happy with.

In Escape, each player suggests a survivor group, and the other players make members of that group.  Characters are usually horrible stereotypes.  Guilty (very guilty) humor usually ensues.

Our characters were:

The AAers

Sherinda, a crack-whore, and multiple-drug/substance addict, played by me.
Mrs. Van Hooter, a husky old lady and devout Christian, played by Brendan.
A drunken ex-cop, played by Sabe.

Since it was Halloween, most of the AA group didn't show up.  So they left the church basement to go find some crack.
"We took an oath to God that we wouldn't drink anymore.  So let's find some crack instead."
A fender-bender trying to leave the parking lot left them on foot, and going through the dangerous abandoned factory district to try to get to the crack house.  Sabe's cop was killed by some criminals who recognized him, and Sherinda died while trying to whore herself out for money for crack, leaving Mrs. Van Hooter to escape...

The Lame Trick-or-Treaters

Hobart, a 10 year old with downs syndrome, dressed as Bruce Springsteen, played by Brendan.  (Hobart was the star of the show.  "Don't call me retard, you retard.")
Riley, 8 year old dressed as a giant robot, played by Tim.
Jared, 5 year old dressed as a "swamp monster" (he rolled around in the mud), played by Sabe.

The trick or treaters found a 'haunted house,' which was really a site of a tentacle attack.  Jared rescued a kitty cat from the house, then the kids went and loaded up on chocolate at the candy super store, but Jared got pulled into a storm drain by a tentacle after sulking when his kitty cat ran away.

By this point, the tentacle menace was starting to get into full swing.  Hobart and Riley went back to Riley's place, but his parents were gone and the house was in fire.  It looked bad for the boys, but Mrs. Van Hooter showed up to save them- revealing that she was Hobart's mother, and sacrificing herself to allow the boys to get away.

"Hobart, I'm sorry I drank so much while I was pregnant with you.  Hopefully I can give you a better life."

The Beauty College Graduates
Guy Montenegro, flamingly gay hair stylist, played by Me.
Overly talkative beautician, played by Tim.
Self-cutting beautician, played by Sabe.

This one started out with the beauticians doing free halloween costumes for the neighborhood kids.  Guy was dressing up little boys in drag, and dealt with some angry fathers.  There was some business with mutant rats, whether or not indigo was the new pink or not.  They escaped the tentacle/rat infested beauty college, to the crack house neighborhood, where Tim's chatty salonist was run over a truck while on hold for 911, and the tentacles collapsed the house on Guy while he was inside with a double-entrendre filled exchange with the drug dealers.

The Furries

Samantha the Sexy Squirrel, played by Brendan
Sonic the Meth Addicted Hedgehog, played by Tim
Wendy the Depressed Walrus, played by Me.

This was one of the more twisted survivor groups we've seen in a while.  On the one night of the year they can go out and be themselves, the furries attended the zoo in their fursuits.  Some teenagers tried to pick a fight, and Sonic went into cardiac arrest on the very first roll of the game.  All the animals were escaping from the zoo.  Wendy kidnapped a chimp from the monkey house, and the ladies went to the Den, the local furry hangout.

The Den was under assault by tentacles, coming up through the pipes in the basement yiff-room.  The ladies bravely fought back, clearing out the place of tentacles.  But other survivors wanted to hole up in the Den, and they weren't too keen on sharing it with some furries, and tried to kick the ladies out.  Samantha was killed and the tentacles filled up her fursuit, leaving Wendy none the wiser... for a while.

Endgame

Wendy the Walrus met up with Riley, Hobart, and Sabe's Beautician, holding out in the dangeous factory district.  Sabe's Beautician died to the tentacles at the start of endgame, so Sabe played the tentacles for the rest of the game.  The dice were hot for the players- we managed to get to the heliport without any other causualties, Wendy the Walrus pushing the kids in a shopping cart right up to the helicopter, and getting them evacuated, and forming a twisted family, where they kids could wear whatever costumes they wanted (robot and elephant) all the time.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Willow,

Quit using up all the good group ideas in your playtesting! I haven't had a chance yet! I somehow knew Furries would be showing up in a Tentacles game one of these days.

Hobart is now my officially-favorite player-character from Forge posts. It's a good thing I'm not inclined to use a sig.

Willow, it looks as if Endgame isn't that different from the first draft, perhaps a little streamlined. I'm still not sure that the heliport carries enough climactic weight; in a way, it's just more escaping when the whole game so far has already been about escaping.

I know that my notion about a Showdown at that "now we make our final escape" point is a little aggressive in terms of adding stuff to the game, but I still find it oddly compelling. I can't advocate it outright because I haven't playtested it myself (yet!!) ... perhaps it could be tried out as a "strongly recommended option" at that stage if it pans out well?

Best, Ron

[David Berg]

Willow,

That's some funny stuff.  I can't help but ponder which was the most fun in play: lampooning stereotypes, having lame characters die in embarassing ways, or simply throwing character one and character two and a tentacle attack in the same space and letting them bounce of each other.

Accordingly, I envision three satisfying ways the game might possibly end:
1) some hilarious facet of a surviving character's stereotype causes death or escape for the whole group
2) the most humiliating death scenario anyone can envision happens
3) the survivors form a new interlocking-stereotype symbiosis that gets them through to a brighter tomorrow, which also happens to sound like a pitch for the worst sitcom ever (like, y'know, a furry giving a retarded kid freedom to play dress-up constantly)

Maybe it would be guaranteed that one of these would happen, but "which one" isn't decided until the finale...

Sorry I can't suggest ways to make these happen rules-wise, I haven't read your rules.  Are they viewable somewhere?  (I like this idea enough to want to playtest it, but my schedule likely won't allow that.)

Ps,
-David

P.S. 3a) the symbiosis INCLUDES the tentacles

[Willow]

David-

Send me an email (it's listed in my profile.)  I'll send you a copy of the playtest rules.  It's a one shot that plays in a few hours, so if you can get a few people together, it's easy to play.

Ron-

You're just going to have to run some sessions and brag about the twisted survivor groups you came up with.

I'm looking for more playtesting data before seriously altering the endgame rules, but I have a few potential variants in mind.  The simplest is a focus scene on each remaining survivor, with a vote as to whether that character will live or die.  I think this encourages a more active endgame, which is good, but I'm still mulling it over.